Llay (Welsh: Llai meaning meadow) first appears in mediaeval records as a hamlet – a small settlement without a church – of the township and manor of Burton. It later formed an outlying part of the parish of Gresford, but the relatively late growth of the village is shown by the fact that the first church service was not held there until 1916, and its church was not completed until 1925.Llay was eventually made a separate parish in its own right in 1944.
Prior to the 1960s, Llay was a coal mining village. Llay Main Colliery, at one time the largest colliery in Wales and after 1952 the deepest pit in the UK, was a major employer for the area before its coal reserves were exhausted in 1966.
Much of the growth of the village is connected with the development of coal mines, particularly the Llay Main Colliery. It was first established by the industrialist Sir Arthur Markham in 1913, but sinking of the shafts was interrupted by World War I and by Markham’s death in 1916. The shafts were eventually completed in 1921, and coal production started in 1923. The colliery had a reputation as a well-run, modern pit with a relatively satisfied workforce, and by the 1930s was employing more than 3000 men, 450 families being installed in new housing schemes in Llay.
There is a country park in Llay called Alyn Waters Country Park, which has a sister country park in Gwersyllt of the same name. The site includes a children’s play park and pathways for pedestrian and cycle access through the forest. There were numerous original artworks around the park such as carved wooden animals along the paths, however many of the artworks have now been stolen or destroyed. There is a small golfing range at the park, and other sporting events take place on the large playing fields, such as football (home of Llay United Youth Football Club) and archery.
There are four churches in the village of Llay; the Roman Catholic St. Francis of Assisi, Llay Community Church of the Nazarene, St. Martin of Tours of the Church in Wales and the Bethel Baptist Church.
There is an industrial estate in Llay, being similar in size to the whole village itself, which it includes a Sharp Electronics factory.Llay was a rural area during the war. Its war memorial records that only one local man was killed in the war. After the armistice, work resumed on digging the shaft for the new Llay Main colliery, which opened in 1921 and became Wales’s largest deep coal mine. Llay main colliery, once the largest pit in Wales and after the No. 1 shaft (downcast) was deepened to over 1000 yards in the 50’s the deepest winding shaft in the country. Its massive steam winding engine had a conical winding drum instead of a balance rope to aid equilibrium.
Hundreds of houses were built for the large numbers of miners and other workers and their families. Soon the population justified its own church, which initially came under the parish of Gresford. In 1944 St Martin’s Church became the parish church of Llay.
The church is dedicated to St Martin, a fourth-century Roman soldier who converted to Christianity after dreaming of Christ wearing the half of his cloak which he had given to a beggar. He became Bishop of Tours, France. In the Middle Ages, a garment said to be Martin’s cappa (cloak) was taken around Europe. Shacks known as capelli were erected to house the cloak on its travels, and the word chapel (capel in Welsh) comes from this.
